Follow these essential folding tips to make your clothes and linens look fantastic

Laundry is the never-ending chore. You sort. You pre-treat. You wash. You sort again. You dry. And then you still have to fold. We asked Carolyn Forte, the director of the Home Appliances and Cleaning Products lab in the Good Housekeeping Research Institute, for the common folding missteps that could ruin all of your hard work—and how to avoid them.

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1. Letting clothes sit in the dryer
If you don't remove them almost immediately, they will start to wrinkle. But here's something you might not know: Many dryers have an extended tumbling cycle that sporadically tumbles clothes to keep wrinkles from setting in. It's a feature worth looking into if you're not the type who can jump as soon as the dryer's buzzer sounds (read: everyone).

2. Forgetting to "shake and smooth"
Shaking out clothing and linens before folding will help your items lay flatter on the shelf. An extra shake keeps bath towels fluffy, and smoothing them out on a flat surface prevents the trim rumpling.

3. Overlooking the fabric
Forte's rule of thumb: "Things that are slippery and hard to fold are probably best hung." This includes silk, polyester and nylon fabrics. Knits and sturdy sweaters can easily be folded without fear of creasing.

4. Folding bras in half
"If you fold them with one cup inside of the other, you risk messing up the shape and shifting the padding," Forte explains. Instead, nest them inside each other in a row, like you might see in a store.

5. Rolling socks into a ball
Balling socks can stretch out the elastic. For heavier socks (athletic socks or men's socks) put the two socks together and fold them in half.

6. Forgetting how something will look when you wear it
Every item of clothing is different, but when you fold, "consider where you do and don't want creases," Forte advises. For example, don't fold sweaters or tops in half lengthwise. This will cause a crease to form right down the middle that will set in when you pile garments on top of each other.

7. Storing folded sweaters on a high shelf
It's a familiar scenario: You reach up high for your favorite sweater, and cause the whole stack to fall to the floor. Try a lower shelf, so you can hold the pile with your free hand as you pull out the top you want.